The Wandering Spirit
by Voidfish
Summary: Harry is no stranger to death, being the spirit that escorts children's souls to the afterlife. But in all of his immortal existence, he only attends one funeral. Unknown to him, it's also his own.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: This might be expanded on in the next couple of days, 'cause I was _flooded_ with ideas while I was editing this. Now it's just a question of whether or not I have enough time and inspiration...  
**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

He is constantly surrounded by death, but he only attends one funeral in his years of wandering. It was held three days after he awakened in the forest, but even years later, he doesn't know why he chose to attend that particular service. He had never met the teen whose funeral he attended—or if he did, he didn't remember him—but he risks the icy-cold sensation of being walked through and attends the whole thing.

There are many tears and heart-felt stories throughout, but his attention is consistently captured by two teens in particular. He is almost certain that the two are dating, and even as he watches, the red-haired boy pulls the shorter brown-haired girl to his chest, presumably murmuring words of comfort into her ear.

Maybe it's selfish to be envious of the dead, but he finds himself wishing he had friends like those, kind people who would cry over him and wonder if he was in a better place.

But it was wishful thinking at its finest, of course. The boy in the coffin was obviously well-loved if the hundreds of people in attendance were any indication, and who was there to love _him_ if no one even realized that he existed?

(Once, still at the funeral, he thinks he sees a platinum-haired girl staring at him. But she just smiles sadly and waves in his general direction before resuming her conversation, so he dismisses the whole incident as a strange coincidence. In the years of loneliness that would follow, he would regret not talking to the strange girl. But their next encounter was decades later, when it was time to collect her soul and it was far too late.)

But maybe the envy of the dead boy ran deeper than he thought. He doesn't know when it first happened, but over the years _(decades,_ _centuries_ ), he finds himself unconsciously using the name as his own.

(And, yeah, he'll occasionally get a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach when he finds his thoughts straying to the name's origin, but he's usually able to dismiss the feeling pretty quickly. He needed something to call himself, after all, and the dead have no use for things as trivial as names. Besides, that boy's particular name, Harry James Potter, just feels _right_ to him somehow in a way that simple pronouns like "he" or "him" do not.

(And anyway, there's no one to judge him for it, is there?)

* * *

The blonde girl is the last one to see him for a very long time, until one day, he meets a white-haired spirit crying over the body of a _(clearly frostbitten, clearly dead)_ child. But even as blue eyes bore holes in the back of his head, Harry says nothing to him, just collects the child's soul and leaves.

(He doesn't think he could take the disappointment if the other boy's acknowledgement of his existence was just another fluke.)


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Thank you to the fourteen people who favorited, the seventeen people who followed, and** **firehedgehog** **and** **The Crimson Mage** **for reviewing. You guys seriously made my day!**

 **Also, thank you to The Heroes of Olympus Girl for giving me some much-needed confidence boosts. Without you, this story wouldn't be posted, much less updated.**

 **Anyway, enjoy! I promise that it's really complete this time, although I might make some minor revisions in the future. ;)**

* * *

Harry would have been more than happy to ignore the white-haired boy for the rest of his immortal life. But the other spirit, it seemed, was not so easily discouraged. Although they meet at random times over the next two years, Harry never acknowledges the other boy until an unusually cold day in mid-January.

He is coaxing the soul out of the body of a nine-year-old girl— _car accident because of an icy road; the doctors were able to save her mother's life, but they couldn't save hers_ _—_ when the temperature of the hospital room he's in drops by half of a degree. The change would be nearly imperceptible to any human, but Harry stiffens at it. He tries to tell himself that it was just his imagination, but he can feel a pair of bright blue eyes trained on him even as he wishes for their owner to go away.

Finally, he has had enough of his observer. "Who are you?" Harry asks, lifting the soul out and storing it in his satchel in a fluid movement born out of many, _many_ years of practice. (And don't ask why he has a satchel. It was convenient to have his hands free, alright?)

"I'm Jack. Jack Frost," his stalker replies surprisingly quickly. It was a shame, really—he needed test subjects for his Grim Reaper impression _,_ but they've been in (unsurprisingly) scarce supply.

Harry settles for raising his eyebrows instead. "Like _the_ Jack Frost?"

"The one and only."

Harry only eyed him skeptically for a moment or two before shrugging. In his time as a spirit of death, he'd seen—and overheard—weirder things. If the Tooth Fairy was apparently a part woman, part hummingbird hybrid, why couldn't Jack Frost be the pale, way-too-skinny boy in front of him? "Okay, so you're Jack Frost. Why have you been stalking me?"

"I haven't been _stalking_ you!" Jack protests immediately. Harry notices it's more of a complaint about Harry's _word choice_ , though, rather than a denial of Harry's claim. Huh. Interesting.

"Really?" Harry asks, his eyebrows raised yet again. "You do know what the definition of a stalker is, right?"

Jack pauses for a moment. "Okay, I can see your point," he concedes, "but I was just following you. It's not like I was harassing you or anything!"

"You sure were _annoying_ me," Harry mutters under his breath. And it was true, too—even though Jack tried to be stealthy, Harry always knew when he was being watched, and it never failed to make him feel uncomfortable.

"What did you say?" Jack asks, privy to none of Harry's internal monologuing.

"Nothing. Don't worry about it."

"Okay, suuuure," Jack says, making an odd face. "Satchel Man."

"What does my satchel have to do with anything?"

"You _have_ a satchel." Jack points out, talking like you would to a baby.

"Well, yeah, I know that," Harry snaps. "It's mine. But I still don't see what that has to do with anything!"

Jack just shrugs. "You haven't told me your name yet, so I'm calling you Satchel Man until you do. Names have power, ya know. You want children to cower at the mere mention of 'Satchel Man'? I mean, dude, you could do so much better!" Jack says, giving Harry a wide grin.

Harry sighs inwardly. Either it had been far too long since his last conversation or Jack was just really good at getting them off topic. Or, on second thought, maybe it was just a combination of the two...

"Is it worth trying to point out that my job is to escort children's souls to the afterlife safely, not to actually _kill_ them? Besides, I won't tell you my name until you tell me why you've been 'following' me for the past two years."

"Uh, well..."

"Well, what?"

"I, um... I-might-have-been-bored-and-you-were-interesting?" The last part is said very quickly, and Jack's voice is much higher by the time he finishes than it was at the beginning.

"You've been stalking me because you thought I was _interesting_?"

"Yeah, well, are there any other reasons for stalking? Not that what I was doing _was_ stalking, mind you."

He just hums noncommittally. "Sure it wasn't."

"I was just _really_ bored on the first day I saw you, okay?" Jack defended.

"Clearly," Harry snorted. "I'm a spirit of _death_ , in case it wasn't obvious enough for you."

"Oh, don't worry. I've noticed."

Harry paused, the absurdity of their conversation finally sinking in. "You know, I may be over-generalizing, but I'm pretty sure that most people would be scared of me right now if they were in your shoes. Or even if they weren't, they probably wouldn't be trying to have a civil conversation."

"Well, I'm not sure if this qualifies as ' _civil_ ' or not, but come on! Surely you've realized that I'm not an ordinary person by now, right?"

Harry shrugged noncommittally to hide his growing amusement, and Jack took Harry's slight smile as his opportunity to make his pitch.

"Hey, listen," Jack said. "It's up to you, but I've got some people that really I want you to meet. They're my friends, and they're really nice people!" Jack exclaimed. "Plus, no offense, but I think you could really do with some socializing."

Harry just stood there for a moment or two in shock before he turned on his heel sharply, letting the abrupt action convey the nature of his response. "Sorry, but I've got to go and deliver this soul," Harry said, his voice oddly monotonous. It was only then that Jack realized how _lively_ the other boy had been while they talked. But now that animated person had been carefully hidden under an emotionless mask.

Harry began to gather the shadows around his body, but Jack broke out of his thoughts just in time.

"Wait!" Jack called, just before the other boy slipped back into the shadows. "I promise I won't force you to socialize or anything like that, but you never told me your name! And you don't want me to call you 'Satchel Man' in my head for all eternity, do you?"

Harry paused. 'Satchel Man' really _was_ a horrible nickname, but did he really want to do this? Giving Jack his name was as good as giving the other spirit an open invitation for him to come and visit Harry and just be a general nuisance. But finally, Harry sighed. Jack would've found a way to pester him anyways.

"You can call me Harry," he says, and promptly disappears.

(So Harry wasn't there to see Jack turn to the body of the nine-year-old girl and whisper a quick apology. While Harry might've been the spirit of death, it weighed heavy on Jack's heart how often he unwittingly caused it.)

* * *

For the next six months, Jack stops by every fortnight or so. And during each visit, he would drop none-too-subtle hints about meeting his friends. But at each and every visit, Harry would always refuse, always with variations of "I don't think that's a good idea." And at each and every visit, Jack would smile, shrug, and promise to give Harry more time to think about it—and then unapologetically bring it up again at their next encounter.

But Jack is nothing if not persistent, and so finally, fed up with "Bunny this" and "North that," Harry gives in. "Fine," Harry says under his breath. Then, louder, "Where do you and your friends meet?"

At first, Jack doesn't even notice it when Harry acquiesces. "Well, they all have their separate places, but we usually meet at the North Pole, in North's workshop." Jack pauses. "Wait, why?"

Harry rolls his eyes. "I need to know where I'm going, don't I?"

Jack has to blink a few times before he gets it, and then he is whooping loudly, calling on the Wind and doing backflips in mid-air. Harry just shakes his head—dare he call it _fondly_?—at the other spirit's antics. If he had known that Jack would've reacted like _that_ , maybe he would have agreed far sooner.

* * *

Harry claims that it would be far easier for him just to travel through the shadows, but Jack insists on carrying him with the wind. It wouldn't be such a problem, except for the fact that they have to go practically _piggyback_ style for the Wind to carry them both. And then there's the _little detail_ that they're traveling all the way from Minnesota, a few thousand miles from the North Pole.

So as a whole, the ride was decidedly uncomfortable. But even so, though the sensation of rushing through the wind, of _flying_ , feels oddly familiar. (And that's weird, too. If Harry couldn't fly even as a _spirit_ , why would it make him so nostalgic?)

But by the time they reach the North Pole, Harry grudgingly allows that there was a reason for Jack's insistence. The snowy landscape really is beautiful, although he's still not sure if it warranted the long trip.

They finally touch down on solid ground, and Jack catches Harry by the wrists just as the other boy's legs give out. "Merlin," Harry groans. It's one of the other boy's weirder swears, but Jack doesn't even blink. After all this time, these _years_ , Harry was finally opening up to him, and Jack didn't want to ruin their new friendship.

"So," Jack says with a wide grin that could probably be called a smirk. "How did you like it?"

Harry pulls his wrists away and collapses on his back in the snow, throwing his arm over his eyes to shield them from the mid-morning sun. "Which part?" Harry says with a groan. "The actual _flying_ part or the landing bit?" When Jack laughs, Harry groans again and begins to sit up. "Remind me again why I couldn't have just shadow-traveled?"

Jack pulls Harry to his feet. "The view, Harry, the view!"

"Okay, the view was nice," Harry concedes, "but now my legs feel like Jell-O."

Jack just eyes him with amusement."You know, right then, you really reminded me of—"

"Your friend Bunnymund." Harry interrupts. "Yeah, I know. Now, am I actually going to meet your friends, or what?"

* * *

The answer, in fact, turned out to be a huge and resounding "no."

All the Guardians were present and accounted for—heck, even _Baby Tooth_ had taken the day off work to come—and Jack and Harry had arrived only a few minutes late. But to the Guardians, Jack had arrived alone.

"Jack!" the large man with a thick Russian accent boomed. From Jack's description, this was presumably North. "I thought you were bringing your friend with you today, no?"

"I did!" Jack replied automatically. "He's right... oh..." he trailed off.

"Harry, why can't they see you?" he asked, turning towards his friend. But Harry just smiled at him sadly.

"They don't believe in me, Jack."

"But you're a spirit of death!" Jack exclaimed, ignoring his friends' flinches and gasps at this new piece of information. They only knew that Jack was bringing a friend along with him for them to meet, not that the aforementioned friend was a _death_ spirit. "How can they _not_ believe in you?! They can't just ignore that people die!"

But Harry just gave him that same sad smile. "Think about it, Jack," he said. "Have you ever seen me collect an adult's soul?"

"No, but I don't see how that matters. They—"

"Don't believe in me because they don't want to believe that children die. I'm the spirit of death among children, and they..." Harry paused, searching for the right words. "They're the Guardians. Their job is _literally_ to protect the children of the world, but some of them die despite their efforts."

"So what does that mean?" Jack asked quietly, almost whispering. It was the most solemn Harry had ever seen the other spirit. "They don't believe in you because they don't want to acknowledge that you exist, that children sometimes die?"

Harry nodded, barely keeping from flinching at his friend's word choice. Acknowledging that he existed, indeed. "Yes. That's it in a nutshell. This was why I didn't want to visit your friends; I was too scared that this would happen."

"I'm so sorry, Harry," Jack said hopelessly, desperately.

Harry just gave him one last sad smile. "It's okay, Jack. I— I've always known that this would happen. I guess I've just been deluding myself all this time, huh?"

And with that, Harry pulled the shadows around himself like a cloak and disappeared.

Jack sank to the floor. The other Guardians surrounded him almost immediately, wanting to know what had just happened and if he was okay. But he couldn't hear their panicked questions over the ringing in his ears and the one thought overpowering all of the rest:

 _I have to find Harry._

* * *

But, thanks to the Invisibility Cloak that Harry owned, Jack's self-appointed task was a little harder than he originally expected. Not that he expected to just find him the very next day, of course, but would it really be so unreasonable as to find him within a _month_?

Jack had first noticed the Invisibility Cloak at one of their first encounters, way before they had become friends. He hadn't known what it was or what it did, but even then, Harry had a habit of touching it unconsciously, like he wanted to reassure himself that it was still there.

But it was only a few weeks before the Guardian Incident when Jack had finally gathered up his courage and asked him about the silvery garment. Harry had hesitated, but he had answered, even giving Jack a quick demonstration. but when Jack asked why Harry didn't use it more, he had just given a shrug and a smile. "I'm practically invisible as it is, so why would I need a cloak?"

(It was only later that Jack realized his friend's smile as he answered was strained, not quite reaching his eyes. Apparently, the answer to Harry's question lay in the area of avoidance. That cloak, seldom used as it may have been, made Jack's life much, much harder.)

In between his hours of spreading snow and joy, Jack had taken to stalking hospitals and the sites of frequent car wrecks. If you named any place where children frequently died, chances were that Jack had spent at least a few days there.

All of this, of course, worried his friends. In the beginning, he'd had their support, even though it had taken them some time to adjust to the thought that the boy Jack befriended was actually a spirit of death. But then Sandy was forced to knock Jack out with his Dream Sand just so that he would _rest_ , and everyone was suddenly a lot more worried about his activities..

"Jack, you need to take better care of yourself," Tooth had admonished, her pink eyes full of concern. "You're running yourself to the ground trying to find someone who doesn't want to be found!"

"Well, what am I supposed to do, then?" Jack had asked tiredly. He had already had the same argument with himself, and what chance would his friends have if he couldn't convince _himself_ to stop looking? "Sorry, Tooth. I'm not giving up until I find him."

Tooth frowned, but she still let him go.

* * *

But one day, all of his effort finally paid off.

(Or so he thought.)

Ironically enough, he wasn't at Burgess' only hospital to look for death that day. Rather, he was there to celebrate _life_ : Jamie's wife, a sweet woman named Hannah, had just gone into labor. Jamie was practically _glowing_ when he told Jack the news, and it made him smile. It warmed his heart how Jamie still believed after all of this time. And something told him that he would have a new, _very special_ believer in a few more years, too...

But the matter of Jamie and his future son or daughter was all but forgotten as he spotted Harry by the receptionist's desk.

"Harry!" Jack immediately shouted, relieved beyond words to have found his friend again. But less than a second later, he winced. He was such an _idiot_. They were separated by a row of those uncomfortable plastic chairs, which meant Jack couldn't stop Harry from just shadow-traveling out of there if he wanted to make his escape. Really, he could only hope that Harry wanted to talk to him after all.

But it seemed this was not the case: Harry's startled green eyes locked with his for only the briefest of moments before Harry disappeared. Again.

Although it pained Jack to admit it, the message was clear: You won't find me until I want you to find me, and not a moment sooner. And Harry definitely didn't want to be found.

Still, Jack persisted. What kind of friend would he be otherwise?


End file.
